The state chronicle. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1883-1893, 1887-04-07
ARE Tnb TINES uARD3
An Old Rladen County Farmer Thinks
God is ScOurginR I for Our Sins.

N.OO IS SCOurgl0K ! > Tor Our Sins.
Especial Cor. STATE CHRoN1CLE.l
WILLIS CREEK, N. c., March 25, 1857
/ read with pleasure, and l trust profit,
the'letter of D. P. McEachern, Esq, of
Robson county, on the h,ndrances to sue
| cessful farming in North Carolina. He is
a man of education, clear headed. is a
tiller of the soil and entitled to considera-
tiOn. His advice is good. My pen is in
hand not TO take issue with him, but rather
to endorse him. However, there are some
phases Of the situation can't understand,
which 90 to show that there is a great era
| of prosperity upon us.
In conversation with railroad superin
| tendent, he urged that times could not be
so hard, for never were the railroads so
crowded with freights; that his road was
making money and he considered every
thing industl ial on boom.
Then l look at the distressed condition
of the tlllers of the soil, and wonder ut
the large business of the transportation
lines. 1t may be accounted Tor in this
way: The farmer is just in the condition
| that he can't stop but must try another
year-secure advances and hope for a big
harvest. The retailer must back him with
more supplies and strain his credit with
| the wholesale man, who in turn must ex-
tend his bank account and is fearful of
loss if he refuses goods to the retailer, and
thus this wheel within the wheel makes a
volume of misunderstanding, we r,'gret to
believe. 10 a crisis. 1t will take several
large diversified crops to relieve the peo
pie. That the condition is squirting the
farmer to his utmost efforts is clear. There
| were never SO many compost heaps In the
fields, and the use of commercial manures
will be greatly lessened.
1t has been a subject Of remark that in
travelling the public road leading from
Elizabethtown to Fayetteville on the west
side and parallel with the river, that you
could tell when you reached Cumberland
by the improved condition of the farms,
tut even slow old Bladen has pulled off
her coat and gone to work, for defy any
one now to discern the difference in the
two counties. But TO better his condition,
the son of toll must gradually learn to
make his crop free from debt. He must
make up his mind to live very hard a few
years, and to realize the changed condi-
tion of affairs and that even if our grand
dadd es did fight at the battle of Moore's
Creek that their pOsterity are real poor
folks, many of them unable to do days
labor, incapable Of self denial, SO to speak.
and need industrial regeneration to make
"A success of it. 1t is the most comforta-
ble thing in the world to be gentleman,
tality. to give darkey half dollar to
hitch in your horses. like we did in the
happy long ago, but it takes means to back
this. There is here one screw Is loose
with mary of US. We must learn to be
mean and stingy like Ben Franklin. Wh,n
We have a dozen eggs to sell, to bull the
market. Predict short egg crop and
worry the purchaser till he pays your price
to get clear OF you.
transportation may he making money,
it takes none of the risks Of production.
but in doing so it is working for trade
based largely upon the promise to pay.
A mortgage on something to be created
out of the mother earth with the raiI and
d. W and sunshine and winds, not always
safe auxillaries is what this trade has to
stand on. Everybody nearly, has had too
much credit, is one of the causes leading
us to the present. state of affairs. 1t has
becn the custom of the merchant to spy.
from his ST ore -door,a clever farmer,a man
noted for his honesty that would not cheat
nor defTaud, spring out on the sidewalk,
shake his hand like he knew his father,
grandfather and his greatgrandfather,
pull him in his store sell him all he wants
and n good deal more, and pay day comes
during bad crop years and two men are
the worse by this system of trade. In
conversation to day with a man ninety
one years old, whose mind was perfect.
| though partially paralyzed, (and a man too.
who made his living entirely by cultivat-
ing the soil, and who was never in debt
and even now owes mo man doilar')
said to me: II am trusting that a.u
| ripe for the harvest. God is scourging us
| for our sins. l have never seen a greater
depression in business way. The chOl-
| era plague seems to come yearly on the
hogs, and no man has yet been able to
| find the cause or prescribe cure. In my
| days farmer could make all the bacon
| he wanted; not now" ''Surely." he
continued, God is scourging u.s." So i will
close by saying, let US turn and sin no
more. CUPID.